Page:History of Goodhue County, Minnesota.djvu/705

 HISTORY OF GOODH1 E ( 01 vn 617 brains and energy look hold of the clay deposits within easy reach of the city, to which earlier experiments had pointed the way, and turned them into products of incomparable excellence. Uultimate success, the cost of which has scarcely been reckoned by later beneficiaries who were not with the pioneers in their first efforts, not only made Red Wing famous but served as a stimu- lant to investments in kindred and other lines of manufacturing. The tide had turned. Red Wing was not only regaining her for- mer position, but going beyond it. Prosperity brought more op- timism, and more men invested more money and expended more energy in projects regarding whose outcome they never enter- tained a doubt. Failures came at times but, nothing daunted, the Red Wing spirit struck out along new lines. Fires devastated . the milling district and laid clay working establishments in ashes, but bigger plants with brighter prospects rose, phoenix- like, from the ruins. The Red Wing spirit conquered over innumerable difficulties which would have overwhelmed men of less ability and weaker determination. As a monument to what Red Wing had ac- complished up to that time and as an advertisement to the world of what the city had to offer, stood the remarkable exhibits at the Minnesota State Fair in September, 1907. The entire build- ing, which had previously been devoted to Minnesota and the Northwest, and then hardly ever half filled with real manufac- turing exhibits, was used to the last square foot of its vast floor space by live exhibits of Red Wing manufacturing industries ex- clusively. It was the feature of the big fair, the pride of the state and the wonderment of the people of Red Wing themselves, who had not fully realized the extent and variety of the local industries. Clay was turned into pottery, useful and ornamental, before the eyes of the interested multitudes; shoes and other footwear was made by deft hands and modern machinery; men's hats, stiff and soft, of highest quality and nobbiest patterns, en- listed great interest ; pleasure launches and marine engines grew before the gaze of the on-lookers ; picture calendars as handsome as those ''made in Germany" issued from the latest triumphs in printing machinery; furniture fit for a king projected its beautiful designs and polished surfaces into the favor of critical admirers; sand lime brick of great strength and remarkable beauty received merited attention; patent wheat flour, long recog- nized as the highest perfection of the miller's art the world over, manifested its quality in appetizing loaves of snow white bread. Soft drinks and malt beverages, malted barley from the large local establishments, barrels and vats for milling and malting, printing and publishing in its varied departments, tobacco and cigars from the leaf to the finished article — these and other fea-